Professor Rosalind Mary Theodosia Hill, M.A., B.Litt.

Rosalind Hill was born in the Wirral on 4 November 1908, the daughter of Sir Norman Hill, lst baronet, a prominent shipping lawyer in Liverpool. She read history at St Hilda's, Oxford, and went on to gain a B.Litt. on thirteenth-century letter books before being appointed to a teaching post at University College, Leicester, as it then was. In 1937 she moved to Westfield College as a lecturer in history, and spent the rest of her working life there; she was appointed reader in 1955 and professor of history in 1971. When the time came for her official retirement in 1976, after a notable spell of service as Vice-Principal, her students petitioned the university that she be allowed to continue teaching and, the college having been central to her life for so long, she taught occasional classes as late as 1992 when it had already been combined with Queen Mary College. The merger between the two colleges was not accomplished easily and Professor Hill, with her serene presence, quiet dignity and wise counsel represented stability during the inevitable tensions and traumas. The wellbeing of her students was always of paramount importance and it is no exaggeration to say that Professor Hill was much loved. She became an influential president of the Westfield College Association and an honorary fellow of Queen Mary and Westfield. Her two major fields of research were the English church in the thirteenth century and the Crusades. Between 1948 and 1986 she produced an eight-volume edition of The Rolls and Register of Bishop Oliver Sutton, 1280-1299, for the Lincoln Record Society, much helped in the final stages by Dorothy Owen and David Smith. As editor and chairman of the Canterbury and York Society she encouraged and promoted the publication of editions of bishops' registers of those provinces and contributed an important part of the Register of William Melton of York, 1317-40, vol. I, 1977. In 1962 she published, with R. A. B. Mynors, an edition of one of the key documents of the Crusades, Gesta Francorum et Aliorum Hierosolimitanorum with a brilliant accompanying translation, The Deeds of the Franks and the other Pilgrims to Jerusalem, in the Nelson's (later Oxford) Medieval Texts series, General Editor Professor C. N. L. Brooke, who was to become her colleague and friend at Westfield in 1967. The book was reprinted in 1978. A byproduct of Professor Hill's researches, and also her love of animals, were revealed in her little book, Both Small and Great Beasts, a study of the medieval treatment of animals, illustrated by the cartoonist, Fougasse, and produced for the University Federation for Animal Welfare. Professor Hill took an active interest in the Institute of Historical Research, and in the Ecclesiastical Society, of which she was secretary and later president. She was a familiar figure on the conference circuit, endlessly knitting through paper after paper, the resulting pairs of socks presented to friends or despatched to good causes. After retirement she shared a house with friends in Radlett, where she gardened, and she also kept in close touch with the family home in Stockbridge on the banks of the Test. The baronetcy had become extinct when her brother was killed in 1944 while serving with the R.A.M.C. in Sicily and Professor Hill inherited the title of Lord of the Manor. Given her vivid sense of history, she enjoyed presiding over the annual siegnorial court but she was always mindful of the needs of the local community, particularly the less fortunate members. Her grace and charm masked much personal grief occasioned by the loss of all her closest family by the time she was 36, some after much suffering which affected her deeply, sustained though she was by her strong religious faith. Her generosity to Stockbridge and her concern for the needy are commemorated in Rosalind Hill House, a home for elderly residents of the village. She died on 11 January 1997, and was buried at Stockbridge, her mace of office carried before her at the funeral.